Nuclear Physics

Description

For this project, we learned about the history of Nuclear Physics. Also, we were able to either work alone or with a partner and create anything we wanted, but it needed to have information about Nuclear Fusion, Nuclear Fission, Radiation, and much more. We could either create a song, book, video, poster, etc. My partner and I decided on making a diary, and we titled it "Diary of a Nuclear Physicist". In our diary, we included information of Nuclear Fusion, Nuclear Fusion, Radiation, and we also drew pictures that helped the reader understand which each topic was.

Physics Concepts

In this project, I learned what Nuclear Fusion, Nuclear Fission, and Radiation is. Also, I learned about the 3 different types of radiation which are Alpha, Beta, & Gamma. Nuclear Fusion is when two atoms collide with one another to produce even heavier atoms. Nuclear Fission is a process of energy production. Radiation is an energy that is released by atoms. If you have too much radiation, that can be very bad. Alpha radiation is the least harmful and slowest moving out of all of them, and it is able to be blocked using a sheet of paper. Beta radiation is lighter and faster and can pass through your skin and water. Gamma radiation is the most harmful since it is an electromagnetic wave. It moves a lot faster and can go through the human body.

Reflection

I really loved how our final product turned out. I think that my partner and I were both proud of how it looked, since it was the way we imagined it. We wanted our diary to look like a real vintage diary, so what we did was print out our pages on brownish/tan paper and printed the front & back cover on a reddish paper. We did not know how to make the pages look dirty, so at first we tried burning the edges with a lighter. Unfortunately the pages did not the look the way we wanted, so we resulted in using tea bags, thanks to Ms. Quinny. She gave us the idea of damping the tea bags and dabbing all over the paper to give it an old looking effect. Although I did like our idea, I think that maybe we could've been more creative. A lot of students in our class chose to do a book, while others made a poster, video, and even a song, which I thought was really cool.